Cultural Planning at 40: The Community Turn in the Arts - ThaiJo

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Abstract

Municipal policies that impact cultural practices and resource allocations for cultural organizations, events, and public art are often determined through a process known as cultural planning, a practice that arguably began in the United States in 1979. This article examines cultural planning in the United States based on a 2017 survey and compares its findings with a 1994 study to identify ways cultural planning and the cultural sector have and have not evolved during its four decades of practice. The article asks: does community cultural planning motivate a shift from arts development to wider community development? Does it contribute to a community turn in the arts? Research found more recent cultural plans addressed a wider scope of community issues and that expectations of cultural planning among cultural sector leaders have expanded. Since the 1990s, expectations of cultural planning have focused more outwardly on community needs rather than internal sector needs as earlier plans did. However, cultural planning fell short in two important ways: integration of cultural plans with general city plans, and more equitable distribution of resources to under-represented communities – meaning communities of color and immigrant communities – in spite of stated intentions to do so.

Keywords: Cultural Planning, City Planning, Nonprofit Arts, Cultural Sector, Cultural Equity

Tom Borrup

⁺

(USA)

Cultural

Planning at 40:

The Community Turn in the Arts

+ Tom Borrup, Arts & Cultural Leadership Program, College of Continuing and Professional Studies, University of Min- nesota. 2929 Chicago Ave., Unit 911, Minneapolis, MN. 55407, USA. voice: +1612-281-6914 email: [email protected] website: www.creativecommunitybuilders.com.

Received 4/7/19 – Accepted 6/8/19

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Introduction

Local policies that impact cultural practices and resource allocations for cultural organizations and events are determined in many cities through a process known as cultural planning. Since the first cultural plan was published in Los Angeles in 1979, it became both a municipal policy-setting and sectoral organizing process.

During those four decades, however, cultural planning in the United States has not progressed in critical ways early advocates hoped. It has lagged behind cultural planning in other parts of the world particularly in terms of the breadth of how culture is defined and the integration of cultural plans within comprehensive city plans. And, current research finds it has not met the expectations of its sponsors in terms of fostering more equitable inclusion of diverse cultures and more equitable distribution of public and private resources for arts and culture. Research for this article examines cultural planning practice in the United States in the ten years leading to 2017, and compares survey findings with a similar 1994 survey by American practitioner/scholar Craig Dreeszen. (Dreeszen, 1994).

Among his findings, Dreeszen observed that the cultural planning process tends to produce a transition within local arts agencies that I call the community turn in the arts. He wrote:

The larger-than-the-arts community involvement in cultural planning accelerates what would otherwise be a gradual shift in emphasis from arts development to also embrace community development. Planning sometimes helps achieve a better balance between these dual objectives. It may be during cultural planning that the potential for reciprocity may be understood and the arts and larger communities ap- preciate what each may do for the other.

While Dreeszen considered that as a positive trend, he also found that:

Most cultural planning centers upon the interests of arts organizations, arts audiences, and artists. Some plans focus on the arts and assert no pretensions to transform communities. Others purport to plan for the entire community, but are concerned with that community mostly for its potential support of the arts.

He cited plans in four cities as outliers that he felt addressed wider community concerns. According to Dreeszen these plans were, “not typical of cultural planning documented in this study.” He went on to speculate that, “they may, however, represent the next generation of the practice.” Such local agencies that exempli- fied this next generation, he wrote, “find themselves to be facilitators, conveners, partnership brokers, problem-solvers, information centers, and advocates of the community and the arts.” In his conclusions Dreeszen observed: The most significant effect of cultural planning was increased awareness of civic leaders and arts leaders of the potential of the arts to enhance community well being.”

Were Dreeszen’s conclusions correct? Did community cultural planning accelerate a shift from arts development to participation in wider community development representing a community turn in the arts? Have cities embraced cultural planning as integral to their comprehensive planning as Dreeszen advocated?

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Taken together, the 2017 data and comparisons with 1994 findings reveal an evolving field of local cultural policy development as well as an evolving cultural sector.

They show important changes in planning practices and topical concerns in some areas, with surprisingly little change in others. These include:

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A widening range of community issues addressed by cultural plans and greater expectations of community leaders for cultural planning.

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Cultural planning has grown to focus more outwardly on broader community needs rather than only internal sector needs.

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Cultural planning has grown more professionalized and helped cultural communities build capacities for collaboration and advocacy.

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Cultural planning fell short in two significant areas: integration of cultural plans with general or comprehensive city plans; and expanding inclusion of and resources for under-represented communities, meaning communities of color and immigrant communities.

Origins of the Practice

From the first “named” cultural plan for the City of Los Angeles (See Perloff, 1979), cultural planning emerged as an effort by arts and cultural agencies and nonprofit arts organizations with three primary objectives: to improve their financial for- tunes and capacities for carrying out their missions; to position local arts agencies as leaders within their jurisdictional territory, and to influence municipal policies pertaining to culture and the arts. Most cultural planning continues to be spear- headed by local arts agencies. In the United States these are sometimes units of local government, sometimes private-nonprofits, and sometimes hybrids. In most other parts of the world cultural agencies are part of local government. As such, cultural planning grew in the United States somewhat differently. (See Stevenson, Cultures of Cities, 2014 for a recent global overview).

For local arts agencies and municipal governments in the United States, cultural planning represents their most powerful tool for setting cultural policy on the municipal or county level. Policies have included public and private investments, development of cultural facilities, public art and festivals, uses of public spaces and artist live/work spaces, among other areas of concern to local governments and to cultural and creative communities. In addition, and sometimes more importantly, cultural planning built the capacities of a community’s cultural sector to self- organize, advocate on its own behalf, and partner with other sectors to address a variety of civic concerns.

British practitioner-scholar Lia Ghilardi (2001:125) asserts that, “cultural planning is not the ‘planning of culture’, but a cultural (anthropological) approach to urban planning and policy.” Australian geographer Deborah Millis agrees. She wrote that cultural planning should not be,

an argument for justifying why arts and culture should receive public support. Nor is it an argument for the arts as a tool for achieving government economic, environmental and social objectives. Rather, it is a way of making visible what has until

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now remained invisible to planners, the cultural concepts which underpin, often implicitly, many public planning policies. If we can acknowledge these concepts and recognize them as living, breathing parts of individual and community life, then we can give new meaning and force to efforts to achieve sustainable economic, social and environmental development (Millis, 2003:9).

Cultural planning, according to Ghilardi, Millis, and others, holds promise to serve as a novel approach to urban policy and planning, what Canadian geographer Jason Kovacs describes as, “an ethical corrective to physical planning” (2011:322).

Colin Mercer, an early Australian practitioner and pioneering thinker, describes cultural planning as “The strategic and integral use of cultural resources in urban and community development” (2006:6). Cultural planning has to be part of a larger strategy, he argues. “It has to make connections with physical and town planning, with economic and industrial development objectives, with social justice initiatives, with recreational planning, with housing and public works.” To make an impact, cultural planning cannot come after the fact of other municipal planning, he argues. Conducting cultural planning as a follow-up to city planning both marginalizes culture (as in the ways of life of people), and disadvantages urban planning by leaving it detached from culture (as in the ways of life of people). It is in the definition of culture used by different planners and communities, I assert, that the degree of marginalization originates.

In his 1994 research Dreeszen described what he saw at the time as a working definition of cultural planning:

A structured community-wide, public/private process that engages the members of a community in communications to identify their community’s arts and cultural resources, needs, and opportunities, and to plan actions and secure resources to address priority needs.

The fact that cultural planning in the United States began to include wider participation of community stakeholders beyond the arts sector, and that some plans addressed a wider spectrum of local community concerns, Stevenson (2014:78) explains as a strategic move:

The significant shift was to link the arts with a range of economic, social and physical goals in an attempt to attract new sources of funding. In other words, cultural planning developed explicitly in an effort to find additional or indeed alternative sources of support for the arts at the same time as it came to be regarded as a resource to be utilized to support local economies.

Planning, in general, provides an opportunity for organizations and communities to formulate and express shared aspirations. In his 1994 study, Dreeszen found that, “cultural planning appears to provoke the local arts agency leaders to see a larger sense of community.” This new study set out to ascertain whether cultural planning embraces larger community issues along with other ways the practice has evolved.

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Research for this Article

The 1994 study reviewed 117 completed surveys from local arts agencies in cities of various sizes. As part of his doctoral dissertation, Dreeszen analyzed 116 plan documents and interviewed other cultural planners to draw his conclusions. The dissertation was never published.

In 2017, working with Americans for the Arts and in consultation with Dreeszen, I surveyed the planning activities of local arts agencies in the United States. I tar- geted just over 200 agencies that indicated in a 2015 Americans for the Arts survey they had completed or updated a cultural plan over the last ten years. An online survey comprised 35 questions, many with a multitude of categories and options, including open-ended responses. A total of 50 surveys were completed by agencies in cities of various sizes, similar to the mix of cities in the Dreeszen study. The 2017 survey included many of the same questions asked in 1994.

Pivotal to the outcomes of plans is how culture is defined in planning. The survey asked agencies to describe how they defined culture in their cultural plan through responses to a list of types of cultural resources, organizations, and activities.

Some plans or planners focused narrowly on the formal nonprofit arts sector while others chose to include community-based practices, activities in the natural environment, foodways, and other activities. Unfortunately, there was no parallel question in 1994, but Dreeszen did comment on the topic. The 2017 survey included questions designed to ascertain costs of planning and time involvement, use of outside consultants, as well as local oversight of the process. Additionally, respondents identified expectations they had for planning when entering the process, as well as results they saw after implementation.

Findings from the 2017 research also benefit from three other but not directly comparable research projects. These included a 1993 review of 30 cultural plans in the United States by urban planner scholar Bernie Jones who advocated greater connection between urban planners and cultural planners; A 2007 study by Carl Grodach and Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris surveyed the policy priorities of local arts agencies in the United States; Work in Ontario by Jason Kovacs in 2011 provides useful contrasts as does a global review of cultural planning by Deborah Stevenson in 2014.

Findings of Survey of Recent Cultural Plans in the United States Defining Culture

The 2017 study relied on responses related to cultural resources, types of activities, and types of organizations included in plans. Dreeszen (1994:237,20) acknowl- edged the challenge of determining “widely shared aesthetic values” in cultural plans. He observed that “cultural plans are usually concerned with nonprofit visual and performing arts, artists, arts audiences, arts education, public art, arts facilities and systems of funding support.” He went on to write that some plans addressed creative expressions of ethnic groups, literature, design, historic preser- vation, special public events and festivals. He found that a relatively small percentage of plans included cultural tourism, downtown revitalization and economic development. In 2017, those topics garnered far higher levels of attention.

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The 2017 survey asked: “in its definition of culture for the scope of the planning, did your plan include…” (any or all of a list of 17 types of cultural resources). The top cluster of cultural resources included in plans indicated by more than three- quarters were:

The nonprofit arts sector 94%

Art fairs and festivals 86%

Independent artists 80%

Cultural organizations including history and heritage 78%

Youth service organizations with creative or cultural activities 78%

Filling out the top third were:

Organizations serving ethnic communities 74%

Neighborhood or city-wide festivals celebrating other aspects of history, culture, or ideologies

74%

Educational entities 66%

The above are commonly, although clearly not universally, assumed among the typical players and venues in local arts and cultural communities.

Among a less ordinary mix of activities and entities indicated by between 50% to 60% were:

Activities promoting civic engagement 60%

Public celebrations recognizing outstanding people or ideas 58%

Neighborhood-based or social service organizations with

creative or cultural activities 56%

For-profit creative businesses that sell, display, or present

unique or locally designed products or services 54%

For-profit creative businesses that design or produce unique

local products or services 52%

Recreational, outdoor, or environmental organizations and

activities 50%

The cluster above begins to broaden to include what are typically considered non- arts entities and activities none of which were named in Dreeszen’s study. These included for-profit enterprises in the creative sector along with recreational and environmental activities. These represent a more inclusive list from most early cultural plans Dreeszen described. While only 56% included the creative or cultural activities within neighborhood-based or social service organizations seems low, this probably represents an increase from 1994.

Among activities selected by fewer than 50%, there was a precipitous drop to 32%

or less including:

For-profit businesses that present or exhibit products

imported into the community 32%

Local food growing or producing entities 24%

Culinary arts 22%

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For communities in some regions of the United States, culinary arts and local food products are core to their sense of identity and creative endeavors – not to mention local economy – yet those resources score lowest of all local cultural resources included.

Without directly comparative data from 1994, it is difficult to assess how the definitions of culture used implicitly or explicitly changed during the two-plus decades. However, based on academic literature and the descriptions and conclusions by Dreeszen, earlier cultural planning appeared to more heavily favor institutional (aka Euro-centric) art forms and their support systems. Dreeszen wrote: “Culture for planners is centered on the arts but expands into various elements that create a community’s way of life. This expansionary tendency creates some confusion about the outer boundaries of cultural planning” (1994:21). In her retrospective analysis of cultural plans in Australia, Stevenson (2005:63) found a similar phenomenon where plans claimed to include a broader definition of culture but ultimately addressed a narrow one. She wrote that there,“ is no explana- tion of the slippage (or the inherent contradictions) between the conceptualization of culture as a process and everyday life that is espoused in the framing sections of the document, and the explicit focus on galleries, artists, museums and other forms of ‘art’ featured elsewhere.”

Contrasting Market Research on Culture

Findings above show considerable variation from wider research on changing at- titudes and patterns of cultural participation in the United States. LaPlaca Cohen, a research and market strategy firm asked similar questions published in their pe- riodic report, Culture Track ’17 (2017:7). In it they reported that, “although we have charted the ever-changing patterns of cultural audiences since 2001, prior to 2014 we never explored how those patterns could inform which activities audiences even defined as culture.” LaPlaca Cohen’s findings reflect changes in the cultural landscape, at least the landscape they defined. By suggesting limited categories and characterizing respondents as “audience,” they already limit results. Nonethe- less, they find significant change from just a few years earlier: “The narrow niche of culture had expanded to include public parks alongside art museums, food and drink experiences alongside dramatic theater, and street art alongside classical dance.”

The LaPlaca Cohen study also looked at the characteristics of what motivates and what can drive audiences away: “Irrelevance is often the culprit: the primary bar- rier to participation is feeling that a cultural activity is “not for someone like me,”

followed by lack of awareness (“I didn’t think of it”). These rank even higher than basic barriers such as inconvenience, not being able to find anyone to go with, and cost.” They go on to conclude that, “people of color (those who self-identify as being a race other than Caucasian, or self-identify as Hispanic) are 82% more likely than non-Hispanic Caucasians to say that a reason for not participating in cultural activities in the past year is that these activities don’t ‘reflect people of all backgrounds.’”

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Figure 1. Activities Defined as “Culture” from LaPlaca Cohen (2017:7).

Arts and cultural agencies commissioning cultural plans, and consultants they employ, appear to be well behind the curve in how they go about community planning and how they define culture. Of course, in contrast to the hyper-local nature of cultural planning, the sweeping national scope of LaPlaca Cohen does not examine the likelihood of considerable variation on a community-by-community level. The point here is not to arrive at a uniform definition of culture to apply to all cultural plans. Few communities and cultural planners have even opened the conversation on the community level about what culture means. Instead they default to the familiar and to the norms of earlier institutions grounded in colo- nialist or missionary ways of thinking – bringing the merits of high culture and the arts to the masses.

Plan Types and Planning Process

Research found no consistent or strictly adhered-to typology of cultural plans among cities or consultants. The practice is generally driven by municipal planning or arts agency leadership and by consultants who conduct the work based on their own experience or what they see other cities have done. Agencies surveyed in 2017 were asked to characterize their most recent plan using typologies devised by Dreeszen.

A notable shift appears away from Arts Plans to more Community Cultural Plans.

This indicates more community-wide planning focusing on a greater variety of topics beyond those that might be within the realm of the arts. A small increase in plans that are components of city or county comprehensive plans is also evident but not to an extent significant enough to indicate real growth in municipal planning involvement in cultural plans.

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Figure 2. Plan Types 1994 to 2017.

A notable shift appears away from Arts Plans to more Community Cultural Plans.

This indicates more community-wide planning focusing on a greater variety of topics beyond those that might be within the realm of the arts. A small increase in plans that are components of city or county comprehensive plans is also evident but not to an extent significant enough to indicate real growth in municipal planning involvement in cultural plans.

Respondents were asked in the 2017 survey to choose from a variety of descriptions that characterize the process of planning. (Process was defined in the question as the way the planning was conducted to involve the public, artists, organizations, and municipal agencies.) Respondents could select as many choices as they liked and the average number of choices per respondent was 2.5. The most common descriptors were robust and engaging, selected by 64%, and by 58% well worth the time and resources. Creative was selected by 38% presumably in contrast to the 12%

who said it seemed academic or research-based, or the 28% who characterized it as standard municipal planning. Only 22% said it was efficient, while 12% said it seemed abbreviated and 8% described it as too long. This suggests most felt the time spent was appropriate.

Using the same definition of planning process as above, 80% responded that the process itself made a positive difference, indicating that well-constructed planning processes were appreciated by a strong majority of the entities commissioning or engaged with planning.

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Professionalization of Cultural Planning

Between 1994 and 2017, average time for planning grew a little shorter and average costs of planning increased about 10% (adjusted for inflation). There was an increase in the number of plans that were led by consultants, and data collection methods became more sophisticated. Together, these suggest an increasing professionalization of the practice.

Figure 3. Mean and median cost of cultural plans adjusted to 2016 dollars.

Data from both the 1994 and 2017 studies indicate more plans were produced in the lower price range while the average expenditure appears to have grown.

Also in both studies, the number of plans produced at the highest-end price tag (over $200,000), were roughly the same. Thus, the increase in the average was not skewed by a few large-budget planning projects but appears to reflect modest growth in average cost.

During the period of cultural planning Dreeszen studied, he found that between 66% and 70% of plans involved a consultant. Of respondents to the 2017 survey, 80% reported use of consultants. This indicates an increase in use and availability of professionals in the field and/or a sense among local agencies that the process had grown more complicated and required assistance from experienced or quali- fied planners. Of consultants employed, the 2017 survey found that a majority were considered national consultants and just under one-third from the local area or region. Teams that mixed local and national consultants were used in 18% of plans and a small number of consultants were considered international – most likely Canadian planners working in the U.S.

Given the growing involvement of consultants, fewer than half of those engaged to conduct or facilitate cultural planning were understood to have cultural planning as their primary area of expertise. The 2017 survey also found that 17% of respondents did not know the primary expertise of their consultants. The mix of professional backgrounds of those conducting cultural plans reflects the dearth of professional training in the practice as well as a lack of understanding of the

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practice by commissioning entities. No comparable question about consultant expertise was included in the 1994 survey.

Because early cultural planning grew as a vehicle to address the interests of arts organizations, Dreeszen (1994:234) observed that the practice borrowed methods from strategic planning and arts marketing research. He wrote, “the tendency of cultural plans to rely upon the simplest planning methods suggests that some training into more sophisticated techniques would be helpful.” In the same light, Dreeszen asserted that, “local arts agencies and [cultural] planning consultants could learn more about the political nature of community planning.”

Methods for gathering data appear to have grown more sophisticated. Respon- dents to the 2017 survey indicated they used more sources of data and tools for engaging their communities.

Figure 4. Data gathering methodologies used in cultural planning.

Dreeszen found the top five methods employed were focus groups, interviews with opinion leaders, surveys of arts and cultural organizations, public/town hall meetings, and random sample public surveys. He reported only two other techniques:

economic impact research of the cultural sector and audience/demographic research.

The 2017 survey offered more choices in response to a proliferation of data gathering and community engagement methods and there appeared to be growing use of multiple techniques. The top three remained the same as in 1994 but not in the same order. The top five reported in 2017 were interviews with opinion leaders, community focus groups, surveys of arts and cultural organizations, followed by audience or demographic research, and economic impact of the cultural sector. Also employed by more than half and at the same rate in both surveys were

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public/town hall meetings. Public or town hall style meetings are a formal require- ment for most municipal planning processes in the United States. Thus, it seems surprising that it was used by fewer than 60% of cultural planning projects.

Cultural asset mapping, a technique considered foundational to cultural planning by many practitioners internationally was not found in the Dreeszen study. In the 2017 survey it was employed by 42%. Cultural planners, especially in Canada and Australia such as Greg Baeker and Colin Mercer, cite asset mapping as the corner- stone of the practice. Some have developed sophisticated techniques for conducting cultural mapping and for engaging stakeholders in mapping processes. Ste- venson (2014:39) writes, “cultural asset mapping, widely accepted as being the first step in any cultural planning project is about place and tracing the intersection of place and meaning.” However, at least in the U.S., cultural asset mapping was not a widely-used approach, especially in early cultural planning. And, given that fewer than half those surveyed in 2017 used asset mapping, it is still not standard practice.

Surveys of artists were used by 38%, and economic research on the creative industries by 32%. In descending order additional methods not reflected in Figure 4 used by between 20% and 30% were:

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Branding/identity research

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Artist-led creative processes

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Interactive web/social media

•

Partnerships with municipal agencies

•

Partnerships with community groups

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Partnerships with academic institutions

This wider mix of methods and less dependence on a few data sources suggest greater sophistication and presumably inclusion of more people and more community organizations in planning processes.

Relationship to City Comprehensive Plan and Planning Oversight

Research presented here indicates that cultural planning has not moved measurably closer to the “joined-up, cross-departmental approach” (Kovacs, 2011; Mercer, 2005) found among most cultural plans in Australia, the United Kingdom, and Canada – although far from fully integrated with comprehensive city planning.

Observing this wider purpose, Baeker (2010:vi) writes in a Canadian context, Cultural planning is about harnessing the assets of a community; celebrating the unique resources, such as heritage properties, natural assets, and community spirit;

revitalizing downtown cores that too often have deteriorated; honouring and respect- ing the unique contributions of our artists and artisans; creating diverse and safe neighborhoods; raising the bar for urban design; protecting our green spaces and be- coming better stewards of our environment; and the many other elements that make up a community moving forward confidently in the 21st century.

Through his study of cultural plans in Ontario, Kovacs (2011:321,337) asked whether cultural planning is “anything more than a fairly traditional arts policy with a different name…that usually fail to address more than arts sector con-

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cerns.” In these Canadian plans, he found, “the arts-related deficiencies identified in recent studies in Australia, Britain, and in earlier works from the USA are not as evident.” Stevenson (2014:77) concurs and writes, “there is also evidence that in Canada cultural planning may be more strongly integrated into municipal ap- proaches than is the case in other nations and that Canada is rather effectively negotiating the art-culture dualism. This art-culture dualism refers to the formal and often institutional practice of art, typically Western European forms, and culture which speaks to a far wider range of social practices that may vary widely among different ethnic and regional populations.

Dreeszen asked a singular question related to the relationship of cultural plans to municipal planning and found that 49% of plans in his survey had been adopted formally as part of their respective city comprehensive plan. He advocated that cultural planning “needs to be integrated with other forms of community-wide planning” (1994:234). The 2017 survey found an insignificant variation with 52%

reporting their plan had been adopted into the city comprehensive plan. The lack of change in the percentage of plans adopted into city comprehensive plans is one of the surprising findings in this research.

Italian cultural policy scholar Eleonora Redaelli (2019:33) found more nuanced relationships between cities and cultural planning. She examined comprehensive plans, as well as cultural plans from 18 cities in the United States that belonged to a national arts federation. Most of these cities’ comprehensive plans referenced arts, creativity, and/or cultural amenities in a variety of ways. In parallel, she found that many of those cities’ cultural plans referenced development related to public spaces, housing, transportation, parks, and economic development. Some cities, she writes, “extensively integrate arts into their comprehensive plan but have not engaged in a cultural plan.” She goes on to observe that, “other cities have robust cultural plans but their comprehensive plans do not mention the arts.”

Expectations Versus Outcomes

Reasons for entering into cultural planning were subject of a series of questions in the 2017 survey. Parallel questions towards the end of the survey related to subse- quent outcomes or changes in the community respondents experienced. In most cases expectations of planning were greater than reported outcomes, not unex- pected as planning is aspirational. In all but one of the 22 categories of outcomes in the 2017 survey, expectations exceeded outcomes by an average of 18 points.

More importantly, in comparison with data from 1994, the types of expectations and outcomes changed significantly.

Planning to Advance Cultural Sector Needs

The highest positive outcome reported in 2017 was in building connections among the cultural activities in the community. Eighty-eight percent hoped to achieve this result in contrast to 84% who rated this as a positive outcome, also one the highest expectation-to-outcome showings. This indicates that organizing within local cultural sectors was an important goal and was successful.

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Figure 5. Expectations vs. outcomes relative to concerns within the cultural sector.

A major concern within most industries or professions is to advance its own interests, usually economic. The greatest variation between expectation and outcome in the 2017 survey was in finding new financial resources for the arts where. In this area 90% rated this an important goal against 46% who reported it as an outcome. Elsewhere in the 2017 survey, a similar question asked whether as a result of planning the community experienced greater public investments in the arts and greater funding from private sources. In this case 58% and 59% respectively reported there was more or significantly more funding from those sources. Com- pared with the 1994 survey, 42% said finding new financial resources was among the reasons they conducted planning while 66% said they subsequently experienced an increase, an outcome that was apparently surprising to some.

In other outcomes, 80% in 2017 indicated they entered planning hoping to better organize the cultural community to advocate on its own behalf and 72% reported they achieved more capacity for advocacy. In 1994 Dreeszen found that 59%

entered planning with this expectation compared with only 19% who indicated favorable outcomes in capacity for collective advocacy – surely disappointing to many. However, the change in this area between 1994 and 2017 strongly suggests that cultural planning has significantly changed in regards to its success at sector organizing.

An area with one of the lower expectations in 2017 was assessing the need and viability of new cultural facilities – with 42% expecting progress in that area and the same percentage indicating affirmative results. Dreeszen reported in the 1994 survey that only 12% entered planning with that expectation but 58% indicated this as an outcome. This was one of two areas in the Dreeszen report where outcomes rated higher than expectations. The other, mentioned above, was in finding new financial resources. These suggest that cultural planning from the 1980s was, as Dreeszen concluded, centered on the interests of arts organizations and arts audiences. The new data suggest some shift in that regard.

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Planning to Advance Wider Community Concerns

The top reason cited for conducting a cultural plan in the 2017 survey by 94% was to enable the cultural community to make greater community impact. What kind of impact was not specified but this indicates a desire to contribute outwardly to the community rather than an inward focus on benefits to the sector itself. In comparison, 76% reported greater community impact resulted from their plan, in line with the average variation between all expectations and outcomes.

Figure 6. Expectations vs. outcomes relative to community-wide concerns.

The second highest positive outcome was in learning new ways arts and culture can bring value to the community. Here 80% reported gains in this area against 82% who hoped for this result, a high expectation-to-outcome. In the 1994 Dreeszen study, only 19% reported learning new ways to bring value to the community as an outcome, another dramatic change in the nature of expectations between the two time periods.

Tied for second highest expectation in the 2017 data with finding new financial resources was identifying strategies to apply cultural resources to civic priorities. In this case 90% held this expectation while 68% indicated improvement in applying cultural resources to civic concerns. Nevertheless, this compares with only 19%

who indicated it as an outcome in 1994.

Downtown or neighborhood, economic, and tourism development are all areas that showed consistently higher outcomes in 2017 compared with the 1994 survey.

These are areas that seem to have more contemporary relevance as the cultural sector began to see itself taking a role in local economic development since the 1990s. Organizing arts and culture for downtown or neighborhood development was an expectation among 62% in 2017, with 58% reporting greater impact on development. In the Dreeszen study 34% indicated downtown or neighborhood development as a result.

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Mobilizing the cultural sector on behalf of tourism was an expectation among 70%

in 2017, with 52% experiencing positive outcomes. Only 15% of respondents in the Dreeszen study indicated favorable outcomes related to tourism. There was a higher expectation in 2017 for bringing the cultural community together to work on economic development at 76%, with 56% seeing more such coordination. In the Dreeszen study 18% expected planning to increase involvement in economic development with 15% reporting favorable outcomes.

Planning for Cultural Equity

While cultural planning appears to have moved the cultural sector towards addressing more outward community concerns, one area of significant shortcoming stands out. Allocating more resources for under-represented communities ranked the lowest of all outcomes of cultural planning. While 70% expected this to be an outcome, only 30% reported progress. This ranked as the second greatest variation in expectation to outcome and should be of concern to communities and cultural planners alike. Of the 30% who reported allocation of more resources to under-represented communities as an outcome, only 4% reported allocating much more and 26% reported only somewhat more. In this same question 58% reported conditions were the same as before planning, the highest rating of no change in all categories, and further evidence of the arts and cultural sector favoring Euro- centric, institutional culture. This is disappointing evidence that cultural planning has not contributed to improving the distribution of resources to under-represented communities.

Figure 7. Expectations vs. outcomes relative to cultural equity and inclusion in cultural plans.

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By an almost even split, 48% in the 2017 survey said their plan included specific actions to address issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the cultural life of the community. Given what appears to be an emphasis in the arts sector on DEI concerns, that over half of cultural plans did not address it is highly surprising. A slight majority, or 52%, said it did not. In a related question about removal of barriers to create more cultural participation, 82% entered planning with this expectation with 52% reporting progress in this area. This is almost double the average variation between expectations and outcomes. Meanwhile, 76% conducted planning hoping to bolster education and youth development through the arts with 46% reporting favorable outcomes, an equally lower expectation to outcome variation. In the 1994 study 60% reported positive impact on education and youth suggesting a decline in this area of focus.

Summary Expectations Versus Outcomes

The contrast in expectations and outcomes between the 1994 and 2017 studies – reflect considerably different priorities in cultural planning. The most significant single outcome reported in 1994 was finding new financial resources for the arts.

The second highest was bolstering education and youth development followed closely by new cultural facilities. In 2017 these were among the lowest outcome areas. Instead, building connections within the cultural sector, learning new ways to add value to communities, better organizing the cultural community for greater community impact, and better organizing for advocacy were the top outcome areas. This indicates both changing conditions and expectations in the sector and a shift in the purpose of cultural planning. It provides evidence of a community turn that Dreeszen foresaw.

Conclusions

A number of significant changes or trends in the practice of cultural planning are evident in this research. There is affirmation of Dreeszen’s assertion that, “cultural planning appears to provoke the local arts agency leaders to see a larger sense of community” (1994:178). Cultural plans have leaned towards expanded definitions of culture. While these are somewhat more inclusive, they are not as significant as changes in broader public perceptions of what constitutes culture.

One area where cultural planning outcomes fall embarrassingly short is in cultural equity. There is indication that many see cultural equity as a goal yet it ranks lowest among the outcomes. This is a signal that the sector is either disingenuous or ill-equipped when it comes to addressing issues of equity, and the sector has not been willing to shift resources to this goal.

Among the changes in cultural planning indicated by the data are increases in professionalization of the practice. Greater sophistication in data collection and planning methods are employed and more city governments appear to be taking responsibility for paying the costs of planning. At the same time, fewer than half the cultural planning consultants engaged by communities specialize in cultural planning in a field with a 40-year history. It is not surprising that the ranks of specialized cultural planners have not grown measurably. Very few graduate-

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level courses or any professional development opportunities are available in the U.S. There are no academic degree programs or even minors in cultural planning within urban and regional planning or in arts and cultural management programs. There are no professional associations, conferences or newsletters. Local arts agencies that sponsor cultural plans meet at conferences such as Americans for the Arts which conducts only occasional discussions about cultural planning.

No meaningful change is evident in the percentage of cultural plans that are fully embraced by and made part of city comprehensive plans. Dreeszen and other practitioners as well as scholars in other parts of the world advocate that cultural plans be broader in scope and adopted formally by cities. There is little evidence this has happened. Most significantly, the expectations and outcomes of cultural planning have shifted. Aspirations of cultural planning have moved from an emphasis on serving the internal needs of the nonprofit cultural sector to better understanding how the sector can address or contribute to a variety of other concerns of their communities.

Cultural planning does appear to fulfill a leadership role in fostering a community turn in the arts. The practice brings together the cultural sector on a local level and helps it gather data and express and codify optimistic intentions. Cultural planning constructs strategies to help local arts agencies and cultural sectors find ways to take a more central role in key civic issues in their communities. Yet, there are significant gaps in this leadership, namely in the areas of cultural equity, building relationships with the city planning practice, and providing professional development for those involved in the practice itself. The turn is slow but the practice of cultural planning demonstrates capacity to lead.

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